Seattle City Council Passes Option C Funding for The Seattle Public Library November 12, 2009

Today, November 12, 2009, the Seattle City Council unanimously voted to increase the General Subfund (GSF) support for library services by $860,000 in 2010.  As described in the Seattle City Council’s green sheet Tab 94, Action 1, Option C, Version 1, “[$860,000] would restore 140 of the library operating hours that would be eliminated per the 2010 Proposed Budget.  Increasing GSF support for library services by $860,000 would also allow the Library Board to reinstate some of the 27 staff positions (18.8 FTE [Full Time]) that would be eliminated under the 2010 Proposed Budget.”

The new operating hours for The Seattle Public Library will look like this with Option C as per the Seattle City Council’s green sheet Tab 94, Action 1, Option C, Version 1

 Central:

• Hours remain at the current seven day, 62 hour weekly schedule

Ballard, Beacon Hill, Broadview, Capitol Hill, Douglass-Truth, Greenwood, Lake City, Northeast, Rainier Beach, Southwest and West Seattle:

• Open 7 Days per week (60 hours per week): 
• Monday – Thursday, 10 am – 8 pm;
• Friday – Saturday, 10 am – 6 pm;
• Sunday 1 pm – 5 pm

Columbia, Delridge, Fremont, Green Lake, High Point, International District/Chinatown, Madrona-Sally Goldmark, Magnolia, Montlake, NewHolly, Northgate, Queen Anne, South Park, University and Wallingford:

• Open 5 Days per week (35 hours per week, closed Friday and Sunday): 
• Monday – Tuesday, 1 pm – 8 pm;
• Wednesday – Thursday, 11 am – 6 pm;
• Friday:  CLOSED;
• Saturday 10 am – 6 pm;
• Sunday:  CLOSED

4 Options for restoring library funding November 3, 2009

As the election for new Council members and a new mayor is being decided, important decisions are  being made daily at Seattle City Council. On November 2, City Council began considering 4 options to partially restore library funding. If there is no funding restoration, The Library will have to cut 330 weekly service hours to comply with the Mayor’s 5% reduction in the endorsed 2010 library budget. 21 libraries would close on Friday and Sunday and  be open after six only twice a week. Among many other services, this will impact nighttime classes, community meetings and homework help programs.

If Option A is adopted and the 330 hours are restored, The Library will still close for one entire week in 2010 and will sustain considerable cuts to its Capital budget. Option A, the best case scenario being considered, would  still mean a 3% reduction in the library’s budget.

Board member Tony Provine and Vice President Jennifer Johnson-Fong represented the concerns of many patrons when they spoke to Council members yesterday.  Provine said, “As a part of the proposed budget cuts of $2.6 million from the previously adopted budget, the Library is preparing to reduce service hours at 21 of 27 branches. These service hour reductions account for $1.2 million.

To disenfranchise any communities and restrict service in those areas penalizes those citizens who do not have the good fortune to reside in another community. Many who utilize our libraries are unable to travel to the few branchess open on Fridays and Sundays, and since all branches will be closing earlier, afternoon and evening activities will be significantly restricted. All of this comes at a time when Library services are more in demand than ever.”

Gates Foundation strengthens Library’s Job Resource Center November 2, 2009

The Gates Foundation’s $50,000 grant to The Seattle Public Library, announced this week, will strengthen the services of The Job Resource Center located at Central library.  The Center, opened on June 29, 2009 with initial grant money from Friends of The Seattle Public Library, operates in partnership with WorkSource Seattle-King County. It features six computers with generous two hour  time limits and enhanced job search tools.  Chance Hunt, Assistant Director of Public Services for the library, announced during National Friends of The Library week that 1000 people used the Job Resource Center in September ‘09.

Sylvia Rolle spoke on KUOW about her positive experience with the Center. “…it’s really just changed my whole outlook on getting a job in this tough climate,” she said.

“I don’t have a computer,” Selena Wimmer told us in our library value survey, ”I’ve been able to work on developing my writing skills because of the access the computer lab offers. In addition, I was able to find a job using the job resource area.”

Southwest patron Judith Parlin writes, “I am recently unemployed after 33 years at the same company. I use the computers to research for jobs and to sign up for my weekly unemployment checks.”

Several people, responding to our library value survey, cited the library as their primary location for job resources including Misha, a Capitol Hill and U District branch library patron, who writes, “I have many friends like myself who have given up paying for internet services at home. After being laid off for over a year one friend can’t even afford an internet cafe & sold her lap top, so the library computers are her only option for applying for jobs, as the nearest worksource office is two (recently increased fare) bus rides away from where she is staying.”

In many neighborhoods, library branches are  the only convenient and free location for computer access and job hunting services.

Please support library funding in the 2010 budget

Award Winning Seattle Author Richard Farr Emails in Support of The Seattle Public Library – Join Him! October 28, 2009

The Friends of The Seattle Public Library had the distinct pleasure of featuring award winning-author Richard Farr at their 68^th annual meeting this past Sunday.  Farr’s book, Emperors of the Ice: A True Story of Disaster and Survival in the Antarctic, 1910 – 13, has been named winner of the 2009 Scanduzzi Children’s Book Award (part of the annual Washington State Book Awards) in the category of Books for Middle Grades and Young Adults (10 – 18 year old readers). Not surprisingly, Mr. Farr is a serious user of The Seattle Public Library.

Mr. Farr shared with us the email he sent to the Seattle City Council on Monday, October 26^th.  Please join Mr. Farr and help the Friends reach the goal of 500 emails to Seattle City Council!

Send your email to budget@seattle.gov

The email can be short-

Subject line:  Restore branch library hours. Text:  My name is ____. I use the ____ library. Please restore branch library hours.

For your  inspiration, information and enjoyment, here is Mr. Farr’s email to the Seattle City Council.  Thank you, Mr. Farr, for allowing the Friends to share your words and for supporting The Seattle Public Library:

To the Seattle City Council:

Since I’m an author, permit me to tell you a (very) short story:

Once upon a time, in the year 2019, the City of Somewhere went through a Great Depression. There was so little money that few people even had enough to eat, and they had to heat their homes by burning old copies of the City Budget. Because of the crime wave, public safety was the top priority, and it was clear that some inessential service would have to be slashed. Luckily, one of these was a very expensive and not very important program called “schooling.” The city worked out that it could save a lot of money by shuttering all schools for a week, even more by closing them on Fridays, and more still by not opening most of them until eleven in the morning. Everyone was delighted to be able to save the money for things that really mattered. In fact, because the schools had closed, even some of the least important services, such as libraries, were able to keep operating.

Back to Seattle, 2009: times are tough, but we are not in a Great Depression, and it would take a Great Depression for the city to even consider closing its schools. So the question before you today is simply this: what makes libraries less important than schools? Why are they morally easier to close? Why is it easier to consider them inessential?

The Washington Center for the Book just awarded me this years Scanduizzi Prize, the Washington State Book Award for Young Adult literature, for my book “Emperors of the Ice.” I simply could not have written this book except by spending 15-20 hours per week in the Seattle libraries, constantly depending on the skill and dedication (and availability) of its staff. But I’m just an extreme case: every citizen needs libraries. More important still: every child who grows up in a great and (even today) wealthy city deserves a community that would simply be too ashamed to consider library closures as a budget-fixing option.

Please, for the sake of the city itself, let’s be too ashamed to do this. Do not cut the library’s budget. That Seattle “aspires” to be a “world-class city” is very nice, but the stark reality is this: as everyone has known since the Babylonians, a city in which you cannot go to the library is no kind of city at all.

With respect,

Richard Farr
Author, “Emperors of the Ice”
www.richardfarr.net

To purchase “Emperors of the Ice” click here OR To check out “Emperors of the Ice” from The Seattle Public Library click here

We urge you to restore current service hours October 27, 2009

At tonite’s Budget Hearing, Friends of The Seattle Public Library board member, Tony Provine, noted that “In many parts of Seattle, libraries serve as community centers, meeting places, job resources, social service centers, public education facilities, and much more. They provide safe havens for at risk youth and offer homework assistance for students. They provide shelter and internet communications for the impoverished. They are anchors in each of their communities.” He told Council that the rise in use, over the last 8 years, contrasts with a comparatively stagnant budget. The current operating hours, such as Mondays and Tuesdays opening at 1 pm, are a result of reductions in 2002. “The proposed cuts would reduce (current) service hours by 23% overall and would result in reductions of 37% at several branches. With 21 branches limiting access to 35 hours a week, residents who rely on the Library in these communites would be affected disproportionately. The effect of these cuts will undermine our neighborhoods, communities and the entire City of Seattle,” he said. “The Friends of The Seattle Public Library urge you to restore $1.2 million  to the Library’s budget to allow the Library to continute to operate all of its branches at their current service hours.”

“Think outside the box” to fund libraries October 27, 2009

Josephine waited 2 1/2 hours tonite for an opportunity to ask council to “think outside the box” to find some way to keep our libraries open. She suggested that The Seattle Public Library try to fund itself like King County Library. Weeks ago, during the Library’s Budget Presentation, Councilmember Conlin wondered if there were some way to change the library’s funding structure. Right now, the library is classified as a “non-taxing authority” and, as such, can’t levy for operational money. All operational money must come from the City of Seattle’s General Fund. Capital maintanence, funds which are also deeply impacted by the budget crunch, must come from the City’s REET (Real Estate Excise Tax). Because The Library is bound to get funds from these sources it is always in competition with other essential services during tough economic times. Changing the funding structure, however, may be a difficult task.

Vice President of Friends of The Seattle Public Library presents 2000 petition signatures October 27, 2009

Johnson-Fong sorts the petitions

Jennifer Johnson-Fong presented 2000 petition signatures gathered on Facebook and from The Friends of The Seattle Public Library petitioning drive at branch libraries. She said, “Tonite I’ve brought you petitions from: Northeast, Ballard, West Seattle, Wallingford, Greenwood, and Broadview libraries. My experience while collecting signatures has been consistent. I speak to people who use their neighborhood branch for a variety of reasons and I speak to people who depend on their neighborhood branch either for access to public computers that they can get no where else or for access to the free WiFi. Out of 26 branches and Central 21 neighborhood libraries are proposed to be closed Fridays and Sundays and only open 35 hours a week.” Johnson-Fong closed by asking Council to help all the branch libraries that would be impacted by restoring library hours.

Seattle Free School classes take place during the very hours that may be cut October 27, 2009

Clare Cronkleton, a facilitator at Seattle Free School and organizer of “It’s Sew Fun” at the Ballard library, spoke to Council asking them to reconsider cuts to The Seattle Public Library. “As community members that promote the sharing of information and resources, we are proponents of the same principles guiding the mission of libraries,” she said.”Free school is able to exist because of accessible resources like The Seattle Public Libraries. Our classes, which now range in size from 5 to 120 students, take place during the very hours that are now under consideration for being cut.” She told Council that the library is, “a symbol of resourcefullness, creativity, and ingenuity–the very traits that should be encouraged in times of shortfall.”  On behalf of the thousands of Seattle Community members who have participated in some way or another with the Free School she asked Council to reconsider cuts to library hours.

A city in which you cannot go to the library is no city at all October 27, 2009

Susan Adkins, Seattle Public Library Foundation president, relayed the words of Sue Nevler, Executive Director, E.B. Dunn Historic Garden Trust, who wrote, “As an active and committed library patron I am compelled to plead that you do not make these most damaging cuts of funds to our Seattle Library system. Just last year my husband, George Nevler, was honored posthumously for his participation in the Libraries for All campaign. An ardent reader, he visited all branch libraries, save one, before he died unexpectedly at age 50. Our two boys, one with a diagnosis of autism, are both avid readers. My hope is that their futures, though now diminished by the absence of their father, will continue to be shaped by the wealth of knowledge available to them in the sacred space of their library. I ask you to please reflect and do not make these severe cuts which will have a profound impact on the many citizens of Seattle who have their own unique stories tied to their library.”

She also quoted award winning author, Richard Farr, “every citizen needs libraries. More important still: every child who grows up in a great and (even today) wealthy city deserves a community that would simply be too ashamed to consider library closures as a budget fixing option.”

“Please,” he wrote, “for the sake of the city itself, let’s be too ashamed to do this. Do not cut the library’s budget. That Seattle “aspires” to be a “world-class city” is very nice, but the stark reality is this: as everyone has known since the Babylonians, a city in which you cannot go to the library is no city at all.”

The Cuts to branch libraries are too severe October 27, 2009

Rona Zevin told the Council, “The cuts to branch libraries are too severe.” She also told Council that almost no one knows about these cuts. Zevin was petitioning in front of Northeast branch this week and noted the many people who hadn’t yet heard about the potential cut in hours.  Today’s article , “Library Cuts Go Too Deep” by Mary Anne Gwinn, in the Seattle Times, helped shine a light on the hours cuts  The Seattle Public Library is facing.